


Pawns and Kings

by SilverDagger



Category: Final Fantasy Tactics
Genre: Ficlet, Gen, Missing Scene
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-05-01
Updated: 2016-05-01
Packaged: 2018-06-05 15:15:52
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 451
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/6710059
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/SilverDagger/pseuds/SilverDagger
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>A war-torn country, a lowborn knight with a noble goal and a princess who sees too clearly.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Pawns and Kings

**Author's Note:**

> Written for fic_promptly on DW, for the prompt _Fix what has been broken_

It isn't until she's a prisoner in name as well as truth that Ovelia sees how gravely Ivalice was wounded by the wars. The scars linger in townships with magic-seared walls, and in villages without children of soldiering age; on the highroads and backroads, the cuts are deeper. They ride through wilderness, past burnt-out houses and roads never repaired, and when they stop in the shelter of a half-collapsed monastery, Ovelia is shivering from more than the pouring rain.

Delita sets up camp with brusque efficiency, building a fire where the walls and roof are soundest and bidding her sit in the spot most protected from the wind. She holds her hands toward the fire, feeling numb inside and out, and listens to the patter of rain on crumbling stone. He has never shown her less than courtesy. She wonders if it would be easier if he ever did.

“I know it's a broken kingdom,” she says, when the silence weighs too heavy to bear. Delita looks up sharply, like she's surprised him, and holds her gaze for a moment too long to be comfortable, revealing nothing of what he might be looking for. There's no change in his face, beyond the sudden focus, but she's left with the unnerving impression that he's seeing her for the first time – not a precious thing to be bundled over the back of a chocobo and stolen like a bag of gemstones or a crown, not a princess or a pawn, but _her_. She isn't certain whether that bodes well for her survival or not.

“It's a broken world,” he says at last, and turns his eyes back to the flames. There's something cold and bleak about him, and though she sees no violence in the set of his shoulders, only defeat, Ovelia finds herself more frightened than she can yet remember being in his presence. Maybe it's because she's starting to understand the cause that drives him. Maybe it's because she's starting to agree.

“And you mean to fix it, then?” she says, and it comes out half-cynical but only half, the rest a question with an answer she isn't certain she wants to know.

“I'll do what I have to,” Delita says. His hand goes to the pommel of his sword and his mouth turns grim, but his voice is more sad than cruel, and this time, it's Ovelia who looks away. She can't guess what this man yearns for when no one is looking, or what he might be willing to sacrifice in the service of his goals, but what worries her isn't the thought of what might be hiding beneath his anger and high ideals. It's that she believes him.


End file.
